Breath (9781439132227) (16 page)

The judge sits at a table. The rest of the town council sits with him. And behind them stands Pater Frederick.

“Salz has been accused of purposely infecting Hameln,” says the judge.

Whispering and mumbling come from all sides.

I search the crowd for Ava. Nowhere. I search again, going from face to face, slowly. Then I search for Father and my brothers, for the members of my coven, for Hugo, for Agatha and all the farm families I know. Fear must play games with my vision—I see no familiar face. Maybe Ava stands right before me and the fact that everyone's making faces at the criminal—at me—blinds me.

“Pater Michael has invited Pater Frederick of
Höxter. They have asked permission to speak first,” says the judge.

Pater Frederick motions to Pater Michael.

Pater Michael steps forward, pulling me with him again. My eyes are still searching over my shoulder, so I stumble. The crowd gasps; a fall can be a sign of guilt. I cough. Pater Michael puts up his swollen hands to silence everyone. His hands look strangely yellow in the candle glow. “So many of us are sick.” His eyes linger just a moment on the sickest ones. “We cannot kill the sick. Jesus preaches against killing. Prayer is our salvation, not desperate delusions of being the soldiers of saints.”

A few people murmur agreement. But not many.

“Don't kill all the sick,” says someone, “just the sickest.”

“The sickest?” says Pater Frederick, coming around the council table to stand before the crowd. “The last time I came to town, I told you about the sickest.” He looks at Pater Michael.

Pater Michael says to me, “Strip.”

I'm confused.

“Take your clothes off, Salz. Every bit.”

I take off my clothes and hide my nakedness with my hands.

Pater Frederick circles me, like he does in our
lessons when he's about to make a point. He flicks bugs off me with the back of his hand and crushes them beneath his shoe. “The sickest have swelling in their neck and armpits. They have red spots that turn black. They are feverish.” He stops and points at me. “I see none of those symptoms on Salz. Do you?”

They stare at me. Pater Frederick takes my hands and holds them over my head. He makes me turn slowly. I feel like a rabbit on a spit. But I turn willingly, for the sake of the argument. Let the argument win. Let the principle of order prevail.

Still, a voice nags at me, deep inside my head, way back—so far that I cannot hear it clearly. Something about a lack of logic in Pater Frederick's words. What? A lack of reason. A lack of order. I cannot understand it for the life of me. I'm too weary and miserable to think straight.

“He coughs,” someone says at last. “You yourself told us the disease brings coughs.”

“He has coughed all his life,” says Pater Michael, saying what Großmutter said to Bertram before he killed her. “Those who know him can tell you that.”

The room is quiet.

Then a boy pushes his way to the front. “I know that.” Hugo's hands hang by his sides, and I can see
they are swollen to double their normal size. His days of stoning rats are over. Poor Hugo.

My own hands are strong as ever. Will anyone notice? If they realize I don't have even the first signs of the rat disease, will they turn on me even more ferociously than if they think I'm in the final stages? Whether they find me well or sick, I feel doomed. Still, I pull my hands free from Pater Michael and hide them behind my back.

“Salz coughed when we were children,” says Hugo.

“See?” says Pater Frederick. “And the rat disease wasn't even around then. Salz is far from the sickest among us.”

No one speaks. Reason rules this courtroom. I feel weak everywhere.

“He's a servant of the devil,” says another. “He carries a familiar with him. Even if his own body doesn't harbor the disease, he has brought it to us through his magic.”

It takes but a second for the room to get noisy again.

Pater Michael holds up his yellow hands.

But the crowd won't be silenced. There's talk of torture, of burning. I imagine the smell of ashes.

“Hush!” says Pater Frederick. “In the name of the Lord.”

They finally quiet down.

“A warlock's familiar is all black,” says Pater Frederick. He pulls a burlap sack out from under the council table. It jumps and yowls. He thrusts the bag at me. “Is this your cat?”

I look inside. Kuh struggles out and jumps onto my shoulder.

The crowd murmurs.

“Yes,” I say.

“Hold him so the people can see his neck.”

His neck. Oh, yes. I lift Kuh's head so the white splotch on his throat shows.

“For those in the rear, let me tell you, this cat is black and white.”

The crowd is noisy again.

Both Pater Michael and Pater Frederick hold up their hands and the crowd quiets down.

“Pater Michael is right,” says Pater Frederick, “the answer is prayer. I will lead a pilgrimage to see the curls of hair of Saint Elizabeth of Thuringia.” He pauses.

I remember Pater Michael in the woods the day we buried the cow alive. He suggested belief in oil and wax from the tomb of a saint was no more valid than belief in the magic of any pagan ritual. What about Pater Frederick? Is he no more convinced of
the efficacy of a saint's relics than Pater Michael? Does he seek to manipulate rather than guide?

The crowd doesn't react. They may be as suspicious as I am.

“And if that doesn't work,” says Pater Frederick, “I'll lead another to the tomb of Saint Julian the Martyr at Brioude. I'll ask all the pilgrims to pray to Saint Gall and to Saint Sebastian, to enlist their help in convincing Jesus our Savior to take away this illness from Hameln.”

“And to take away the rats, too,” says someone at last.

“Take away the rats. Take away the rats.” Now everyone's saying it. “Take away the rats.”

Pater Michael's hands are up again.

I stare at those yellow hands, and I remember my own hands in the light that streamed through the stained glass—yellow and green and red—the colors the piper wore. It comes to me in a burst and I blurt out, “I know how to get rid of the rats.”

All eyes are on me.

Pater Frederick tsks in dismay. “Hush, child. Your danger is past.”

“We must hear him,” says the judge. “Tell us, Salz.”

“It will sound like nonsense,” I say, “but it's true.”

“Speak.”

“There's a piper in Hannover who can charm animals.”

“So?”

“He'll pipe and lead the rats away.”

The room gets noisy again. They're saying I'm a fool. And some are saying worse. Those few words of mine may have undone all the good that Pater Frederick just did for me. Am I possessed, that I cannot control my own tongue? But I believe what I say, I believe it as strongly as I've ever believed anything. My meeting with the piper in the woods was meant to be. He's the missing thirteenth from our coven—the one who can make all this misery go away and save Hameln at last. If only I had convinced him that day in the woods, none of this would have happened.

“Quiet,” says the judge. “Have you seen this piper at work?”

“Yes. He charmed squirrels and a skunk and a hawk. He charmed rabbits and mice and voles”

“Rats aren't that different,” says someone.

“This is a hoax. How could this boy even know about a piper in Hannover?” says another.

“I'll answer that, and any other questions,” I say, “but only if you grant me a favor.”

“Don't overestimate your importance, boy,” says the judge. “Your fate is still undecided.”

“All I want is Ava. My sister.”

“Step forward, Ava,” says the judge.

“She's not here,” I say. “Someone has to find her. Then I'll tell you everything I know about the piper. Every detail. And he'll save Hameln.”

The judge looks at me sharply.

“He'll save Hameln,” I say louder.

The judge shakes his head. Then he shrugs. “It's a harmless request.” He calls over a court clerk. “Find the girl.”

The clerk leaves.

“Speak now,” says the judge, “How do you know of this piper?”

“I came across him in the woods one day,” I say.

“In the woods?” says someone.

“Is he disreputable?”

“Is he a criminal?”

“He's a piper,” I say loudly. “And he will save us.”

“What is this piper's name?” asks the judge.

“He's easy enough to find,” I say. “His shirt is red, his trousers are green and yellow striped.”

“Is he a piper or a jester?” someone calls, tauntingly.

“He'll be playing at the beer festivals,” I say. “Without a doubt, you'll find him there.”

“What have we got to lose?” says someone. “We have no other plan.”

Then everything happens fast—instantaneous resolve. The town council members call the lords together and talk about money. They send for a messenger. The idea of charming the rats away somehow catches everyone's fancy. It's unexpected—no one's ever tried it before—so maybe, just maybe, it will work. The atmosphere in the courtroom grows almost giddy. Someone laughs. More people are laughing.

A councilman is advising the messenger. He tells him to take the road built on terraces across the hills. It's longer than the road that lies on the valley floor, but in this rain it's safer. The raised roads don't puddle as fast.

Others give advice about where to go when he gets to Hannover, how to find the piper, how to lure him back. Ah, yes, that's the biggest problem: how to lure a healthy man to an ill town. Pater Frederick came here, and he's not sick; no one in Höxter is sick. But Pater Frederick is different—clerics have to come when the people call. It's their duty. No one else owes us that. The boats on the Weser don't
even stop at Hameln anymore, everyone is so afraid of our illness. This is most definitely a matter of luring. What will it take to lure a traveling piper to Hameln?

The mayor beckons to the messenger.

The messenger rushes to the table and leans over the mayor.

“Offer two hundred gold bars,” he whispers.

The sum is beyond comprehension. That's one thousand guilders.

The lords have overheard as well as I did. They're arguing. Even pooling their money, it will be hard to raise such a sum.

“It's a staggering amount,” says the judge in a low voice.

“Exactly,” says the mayor. “No one can refuse it.”

And the messenger leaves. Off to find the piper in Hannover.

I hold Kuh around his chest and hug him to me. Our hearts pound like I imagine the hoofbeats of the messenger's horse do. Let him find the piper. And let the clerk find my Ava.

My breath becomes pants. No space between time. Just need.

We wait in the assembly hall, which is the same room that serves as the municipal court. Only the town council is here, and me and Ava. The men mill around and talk in groups. But I am made to stand in one place, for everyone wants to keep an eye on me at all times. I will be called upon to identify the piper. For this reason I haven't been allowed to leave the
Rathaus
.

Ava stands beside me, stiff in her loyalty. She has not cried. Not once. But her face is sadder than any child's I've ever seen.

I stay in the dungeon at night. Ava stays with me. The court clerk didn't find her. Instead she revealed herself when they took me back down to my prison room after the town council meeting. She had managed to hide behind the barrels. It didn't surprise me that no one saw her sneak into the cellar. She's made an art of being invisible.

They gave us a pallet to lie upon, and I settle Ava there at night, but I don't stretch out on it myself. I'm afraid if I get comfortable, I'll fall deep asleep—and sleep brings dreams. But they gave it to try to be kind. And they gave us lentils and boiled meats to eat, so it's not like when I was a prisoner.

Still, the corner is a pile of filth. And Ava and I have to hold our eyes and mouths closed and our hands over our ears to keep the bugs out.

It's much better to be here in the assembly room, even not knowing what's to happen.

The rain makes a dull hum everywhere.

I'm jittery. Let them come fast.

As if Ava has caught my mood, she shifts from foot to foot.

The messenger arrived back in Hameln late last night—on the third day after he'd left, sooner than anyone had dared hope—with a piper in tow. The piper slept at the inn. The innkeeper should show up with him any minute.

There are footsteps on the stairs. The room hushes.

I lick my dry lips. I wish Kuh were with us. Pater
Michael took him home the night of my inquest. Kuh ran away immediately. He's lost in the streets of Hameln. He isn't wise to town ways. Still, he's not completely defenseless anymore, so I shouldn't worry about him.

I should worry about us—Ava and me. Let this be the piper I met in the woods. Oh please, God, let this be him.

And it is! He's even more colorful than when I last saw him. He has on his red shirt and green-and-yellow-striped trousers. But he also wears a coat of red and yellow checks, and around his neck is a yellow scarf with green tassels. He does look more like a jester than a piper. And I remember his puns from our day in the woods—he'd make a good jester.

The mayor raises his eyebrows to me. “Do you recognize this man?”

“I do.”

The piper bows low to me. “Good day, my upside-down friend. It's an unexpected pleasure to see you again so soon.” He turns to the mayor. “Good day, fine sir.”

“Well, then,” says the mayor. “I'll get right to the point. We have a problem. We—”

“Rats,” says the piper. “I know all about them. Your messenger explained.”

The mayor looks somewhat abashed by the piper's taking command of the situation.